Snapdeal Claims To Clear Unpaid Seller Dues

Ecommerce marketplace Snapdeal has clarified that no amounts are outstanding towards the sellers on its platform. This announcement comes two days after reports emerged that sellers on Snapdeal have raised concerns to All India Online Vendors Association (AIOVA) about non-payment of dues.

In an official statement, the company claims “payments to sellers are made 6-10 times per month and typically sellers receive their payments within 3-5 days of the sale of their goods and that there are no outstanding amounts in this regard.”

Sellers that had reached out to AIOVA had requested the authorities to seek a stay on the merger of Snapdeal with Flipkart, until their dues were settled. Last week Snapdeal agreed to sign a non-binding Letter of Intent (LoI) for the merger. The group has also said that it will consider filing a civil complaint to bring a stay on the sale.

In March 2017, the AIOVA said that small online sellers were still waiting for their dues to be cleared by Snapdeal. The online marketplace had allegedly not cleared the payments for eight months.

According to an official statement by Snapdeal, any occasional seller disputes are handled through a grievance redressal mechanism, consistent with seller policies and contractual agreements.

In a few cases, it added that details are awaited from sellers in support of the claims made by them.

Talking about the same, Sanjay Agarwal, Senior Vice President, Finance Operations, Snapdeal said, “In these cases, sellers have so far failed to provide required justification for their claims despite multiple attempts by Snapdeal to facilitate these settlements. These are minor amounts, which will get paid basis information provided by sellers and in accordance with the contracts and seller policies.”

In recent weeks, Snapdeal has further expedited the payment cycles for sellers, making payments faster for sellers, which is borne out by the positive feedback the company has received from the sellers.

Founded in February 2010 by Kunal Bahl along with Rohit Bansal, Snapdeal claims to have about 65 Mn products across 1000+ categories. It also has more than 300,000 sellers. It is backed by  SoftBank, BlackRock, Temasek, Foxconn, Alibaba, eBay Inc., Premji Invest, Intel Capital, Bessemer Venture Partners, Ratan Tata, among others.

Earlier this week, it was reported that SoftBank, after convincing Nexus Venture Partners and Kalaari Capital for the merger is now looking to obtain the final nod from the family offices of Azim Premji and Ratan Tata. Earlier this week, the ecommerce marketplace made one last attempt to participate in the big Indian ecommerce battle. With rivals Flipkart and Amazon launching the Big 10 Sale and the Great Indian Sale, respectively, Snapdeal also announced its Grand Unbox Sale.